NC State Baseball. Is. On. Fire.

Usually State Baseball season follows the same pattern; Start off winning every game, before fading late and leaving the postseason early. The ability to close out seasons has single-handedly kept Avent on the preverbal hot seat. So maybe it was time they changed it up a bit…

The Wolfpack have now won 22 of their last 27, including 10 wins versus ranked opponents. Heading into the last series of the season versus Florida State (the #3 team in the ACC), here’s three fun facts about State.

• #4 ACC Record
• #2 Overall Winning Percentage
• Best Road Record

It’s borderline insane how good they’ve been, especially when you consider they lost 9 of their first 13 to open the season. Keep in mind, that month stretch was a solid slate of opponents. The bumps along the way have made for this smooth transition. Sweeping their last two series against ranked opponents? Offensively being one of the top teams in the country? Starting pitching all with just two loses each and team ERA cut in half compared to two months ago?

The Pack is now also listed in the Top-25 for both Baseball America and D1Baseball.

Avent Deserves Credit

This team has shown ZERO quit thus far. Start off the season about as worse as they have in the last 20 years, while also dealing with arrests and suspension of players that were meant to play key roles. Starting pitchers weren’t getting further than the fifth, bats were slow and the bullpen was a disaster (the jury is still out to some extent on if this bullpen could actually hold a game together late).

If any other team in the ACC, or even the rest of the country, started the season in a similar fashion, their record wouldn’t be hitting the .500 mark, let alone second best in the Conference. Avent is always a patient manager and understands his players to a T. He truly feels like the coach that personifies what it is to be part of the Wolfpack family.

Will this be the magical run that gets him over the hump for some hardware?

Current ACCT Outlook

The 2021 ACC Tourney will go with the following format; Round robin of four groups of three, with winners moving to Semifinals.

If the season were to end today, State would head in as the leader of Pool D with Louisville and Virginia Tech (would have been just about the least ideal situation a little while back). State controls their seeding destiny by playing Florida State to round out the season. With a sweep, they would move up to at least #3 for ACCT. A loss or two puts them right back into the mess of 14-16 loss teams.

We’ll cover all the scenarios later this week.

Until then, stay hot Pack, stay hot.